Dissecting a Plate Chiller

[Stoutsmith6]

I have no intentions of doing this myself anytime soon, but the inability to see the inside of plate chillers has got me wondering:

Has anyone ever cut open an old broken or decommissioned plate chiller just to see if anything nasty is festering in the corners or seemingly hard to reach places for cleaning solution? Pictures would be great.

 

[Duda_Energy]

Here at dudadiesel we have. We had so many people concerned about protein getting caught in them, and looking at the winding pattern of the plates we can certainly understand the concern. But after we cleaned it out (lye bath and starsans flush) we have to admit starsans is a pretty amazing product. Chiller was clean (though we did re-dirty the outside edges pretty bad cutting it)

 

[ChocolateMaltyBalls]

^That is awesome. I'm not too worried about it, I think a PBW flush followed by starsan is good enough.

 

[beerbeer95648]

Here at dudadiesel we have. We had so many people concerned about protein getting caught in them, and looking at the winding pattern of the plates we can certainly understand the concern. But after we cleaned it out (lye bath and starsans flush) we have to admit starsans is a pretty amazing product. Chiller was clean (though we did re-dirty the outside edges pretty bad cutting it)

I have seen conflicting info on using caustic in your chillers. I use a 2 percent caustic(your food grade lye) by weight at 175 degrees every 6 or so brews. I recirc about 30 minutes then flush with warm water, then follow with Starsan. Do you see any issue with that and the copper brazing?